F 




QUAKER HILL 

(LOCAL HISTOBY; 

S E R I E S 



VI I L IRicbarb ©sborn/ 
a IReminiscence. 



MARGARET B. MONAHAN. 




Class. 
Book 



Q^nM -] 



RICHARD OSBORN 

A REMINISCENCE. 
Second Edition 



BY 

MARGARET B. MONAHAN. 



READ AT THE FOURTH ANNUAL MEETING OF THl 

QUAKER HILL CONFERENCE, SEPTEMBER THE 

SIXTH, NINETEEN HUNDRED AND TWO. 



Published by the Quaker Hill Conference Association 

Quaker Hill, New York 

1902 



PuDllcations 

Of the Quaker Hii,!, Conference Association 



A Critical Study of the Bible, by the Rev. Newton M. 
Hall of Springfield, Mass. 

The Relation of the Church at Home to the Church 
Abroad, by Rev, George William Knox, D.D., of New York. 

A Tenable Theory of Biblical Inspiration, by Prof. 
Irving Francis Wood, Ph.D., of Northampton, Mass. 

The Boole Parmer, by Edward H. Jenkins, Ph.D., of 
New Haven, Conn. 

LOCAIv HISTORY SERIES 

David Irish— A Memoir, by his daughter, Mrs. Phoebe 
T. Wanzer of Quaker Hill, N. Y. 

Quaker Hill in the Eighteenth Century, by Rev. Warren 

H. Wilson of Brooklyn, N. Y. 

Quaker Hill in the Nineteenth Century, by Rev. Warren 
H. Wilson of Brooklyn, N. Y. (Second Edition) 

Hiram B. Jones and His School, by Rev. Edward t,. 
Chichester of Quaker Hill, N. Y. 

Richard Osborn— A Reminiscence, by Margaret B. Mon- 
ahan of Quaker Hill, N. Y. (Second Edition). 

Albert J. Akin— A Tribute, by Rev. Warren H. Wilson of 
Brooklyn, N. Y. 

Ancient Homes and Early Days at Quaker Hill, by 

Amanda Akin Stearns of Quaker Hill, N. Y. 

Thomas Taber and Edward Shove— a Reminiscence, by 

Rev. Benjamin Shove of New York. 

Some Glimpses of the Past, by Alicia Hopkins Taber of 
Pawling. N. Y. 

The Purchase Meeting, by James Wood of Mt. Kisco, 
N. Y. 

• • 

In Loving Remembrance 4f A"" Hayes, by Mrs. Warren 
H. Wilson of Brooklyn, N. Y.-. 

Washington's Headquarters at Predericksburgh, by 

I^ewis S. Patrick of Marinette, Wis. 

Historical Landmarks in the Town of Sherman, by 

Ruth Rogers, Sherman, Conn. 

Any one of these publications may be had by addressing 
the Secretary, Rev. Bertram A. Warren. 

Quaker Hill. N.Y. 

Price Ten Cents. Twelve Cents Postpaid. 



Gift 

Pub'- 



To My Good Friends 
Richard and Roby Osborn, 

Who have never varied in their loving 
kindness toward me, since I came 
twelve years ago, a stranger, to 
dwell in their midst; and who, in 
my hour of greatest need, brought 
to me the veritable *'cup of cold 
water' ' in the name of our common 
discipleship, I dedicate the follow- 
ing pages. 

Quaker Hill, September 6th, 1902. 



RICHARD OSBORN 

A REMINISCENCE 



Quaker Hii^l has been described as "a 
place which is all length and no breadth." 
This is but an epigrammatic way of saying 
that in miles its length is to its width, as 
six is to one. 

Thus it is that Quaker Hill cannot be 
called a village or hamlet; being only one 
long street, with houses and farms on either 
side. The South, or Hotel end, hardly 
knows there is a beautiful North or farm- 
ing end ; the North hears but vaguely and 
infrequently of the South ; while the Middle 
Distance maintains a courteous bowing 
acquaintance with both. Each little section 
has its own ways, its own traditions ; the 
community of interest which inheres in a 
place having a central rallying point is 
lacking. This remoteness of living tends 
naturally to segregation; whether in time 



to come, there may be found interests 
strong enough to cause Quaker Hill people 
to become a solidarity, is a question; and 
in the answer to that question lies Quaker 
Hill's future. 

Its past, however, is its own, and what 
a past it is. From the time the Oblong 
was settled, about 1730, by Friends from 
Rhode Island, until a comparatively recent 
date, the Old Meeting House was the 
Jerusalem of the Hill people, "whither the 
tribes went up to the testimony of the 
Lord;" and to this day it attracts, as 
nothing else in our midst can do. 

There was no lack of unity in the days 
when those strong, upright, uncomprom- 
ising men and women sought and found, 
on this hill top, and in this building, their 
heart's desire — "freedom to worship God," 
and in the shadow of the Old Meeting 
House, lived out their lives of plain living 
and high thinking. Plain even to austerity 
was the living, rugged and difficult the 
conditions of existence; high indeed the 
thinking which turned out the pioneers of 
many of the advance movements of the 
last century and a half, and made it pos- 
sible to say of old Quaker Hill, "this or 

8 



that great enterprise for the upHfting of 
God's creatures was born there." 

Here Hved, loved and died, sturdy, God- 
fearing men and women ; here they thought, 
prayed, testified, they were granted visions, 
they did their utmost endeavor for God 
and their right, and finally, dying, they 
were gathered to their fathers, and laid to 
rest beneath the sod at the western end 
of the plot of ground upon which the 
Meeting House stands. Tlie turf grows 
green above them; ''no storied urn, or 
monumental bust" marks their resting- 
place; but they left their mark not only 
upon this community, but upon the times 
in which they lived. 

Up the highway, to the northward, on 
the west side of the road, stands a com- 
fortable farm house, gable end to the street. 
It is the site of the old Osborn place, where 
six generations of that name have lived, 
and one is still living, and where Richard 
Osborn and his father were born. Of these 
six generations, not a man has ever been 
known to use spirituous liquors, or tobacco, 
to indulge in any profanity, or to be guilty 
of a dishonest action. 

The situation of the old place is excel- 



lent; sheltered from the violence of north- 
east storms, yet open to the southern sun 
and the pleasant western breezes, and com- 
manding a beautiful view of the distant 
Catskill Mountains. An abundant spring 
of delicious soft water adds value to the 
place. Here, from Rhode Island, in 1760, 
came Paul Osborn, and his wife, Elizabeth. 
He was the first of that name in the Ob- 
long, as it was then called. His nephew, 
Isaac, followed him some four years later. 
The house in which they took up their 
abode, was built of hand hewn timber, 
pinned together with oaken pins ; a story 
and a half in height at the East end, with 
roof sloping long and low at the other, and 
one huge chimney in the middle, round 
which clustered three fireplaces, in as 
many different rooms. These were all the 
heating facilities the house afforded its 
inmates, but 

"Blow high, blow low, no winds that blow, 
Could quench their hearth fires' ruddy glow." 

The ''great room with the bed room at- 
tached," as it is called in a contemporaneous 
document, and the kitchen, had each its 
cavernous fireplace, into which were rolled 

10 



great logs from the forests that covered 
the hills ; but of the "chambers above" these 
rooms, of which the same document goes 
on to speak, imagination fails to picture the 
iciness during an old-fashioned Quaker Hill 
winter, 

This was at about the time when New 
York City, under the governorship of 
Mynheer Rip Van Dam, had grown phe- 
nominally, till it numbered almost eight 
thousand inhabitants, and its northern sub- 
urbs nearly reached Nassau street. New 
York State was a (more or less) loyal 
British colony ; George the Third was still 
Prince of Wales, and the War of the 
Revolution was in the shadowy future. 

Life in the Osborn homestead was like 
that of any colonial yeoman, as farmers 
were then designated. By the aid of cum- 
brous implements of old country pattern, 
they tilled the fertile, productive fields, 
after they had cleared them of timber, and 
marketed such of their produce as they did 
not consume. Of wagons and such con- 
veniences there were none, all journeying 
being done on horseback, all transporting 
of goods by means of saddle bags. 

Within doors the women spun wool and 

II 



flax, and wove homespun on hand looms. 
They dipped or *'run" candles of their 
sheep's tallow, and by their light, or that 
of the great wood fires, knit stockings of 
the wool of those same sheep. They 
cooked over the big logs, with hook and 
crane, and baked, in the great brick oven, 
loaves of "rie" and Indian, sweet, crisp, 
wholesome, dehcious. But in these labors 
the mistress of the house, Elizabeth, could 
not share; for forty years she was blind. 
Yet did this affliction but endear her to 
her husband, a glimpse of whose loving 
tenderness we catch, in reading the provi- 
sions made in his will, for the well-being, 
comfort and convenience of his ''dearly be- 
loved wife, Elizabeth." And the cares and 
duties of her household did not lapse, but 
were lifted and carried for her by one Mary 
Reynold, in such wise as to satisfy both 
Elizabeth and her husband, for he calls 
Mary "my esteemed friend; having had 
some knowledge of her good conduct in 
my family." 

To "friends traveling on truth's ac- 
count," the doors of the old house always 
swung wide. Paul Osborn kept open house 
for "his friends, the people called Quakers," 



12 



during his lifetime, and his will provides 
in the most minute and careful manner for 
his wife, ''the better to qualifye her to keep 
a house of entertainment for friends." She 
is to have ''half his movabel estate," the 
yearly interest on a considerable sum of 
money, and also "speshues," (whatever that 
may be,) of "wheat, Indian corn, rie, oats, 
sheeps woll, cotton woll, molesses, coflFe, 
chocolate, turneps, and potates," all to be 
"good and marchantable." Isaac Osborn, 
his executor, is to provide "a sufficiency of 
firewood, cutt fit for the fire, likewise to 
draw the same, and make the fiers." Also, 
"a good milch cow in the Spring, and the 
same in the Fall," and "he shall keep the 
said cow well in the winter season at the 
barn with good hay, and in the summer 
season he shall keep her well with grass, 
handy for the conveniency of milking." All 
these things to be for his "dearly beloved 
wife Elizabeth, during her nateral life," 
and after her, in less measure, "the same 
to be to Mary Reynold." The "littel 
meadow in lot 29," he gives Isaac Osborn, 
"that he shall keep well all horses of friends 
my wife shall send him;" and should Isaac 
"neglect the injunctions herein enjoined," 

13 



and cease to keep such house of entertain- 
ment for friends, then his right to certain 
legacies "shall decend and revolve to them, 
him or her that shall truely fulfil them." 
And all his lands in the latter case, Paul 
gives to the "yearly meeting for Friends, 
those people called Quakers, of Philadel- 
phia." It is needless to say to those for 
whom the name, Osborn, is a synonym for 
rectitude, that the "injunctions herein en- 
joined" were carried out to the letter by 
the nephew. 

Such was the "plain living" of Paul 
Osborn ; in his "high thinking" consisted 
his life. At this time the Oblong Meeting 
was a power. On First Days the Meeting 
House was filled with a devout throng of 
worshippers, many of them coming from 
great distances, walking barefoot and carry- 
ing their shoes in their hands. In this as- 
semblage Paul Osborn spoke, from time to 
time. No record of his testimonies is left; 
but one may imagine the form they would 
take during the restless excitement and 
suspense of pre-Revolutionary days, as well 
as when, a little later, the presence in the 
meetings of uniformed soldiers served to 
point the moral of his words. There is 



14 



extant no connected story of his life; some 
of its more important dates even, are miss- 
ing. He emerges at intervals from the 
shadowy past, through the medium of dis- 
connected anecdotes, but all of those por- 
tray marked traits of individuality. There 
is something gigantic about this fine, 
strongly marked, individual character; he 
might have sat for the portrait of Valiant- 
for-Truth, in Bunyan's immortal allegory. 

During a visit of a party of "friends 
traveling on truth's account," from Eng- 
land, he felt moved to journey with them, 
to preach and teach, and when they left, 
he too rode away, on horseback, setting his 
face toward the Carolinas, which in due 
time he reached, and whence after many 
months he returned; but no record of this 
most interesting journey has been preserved. 
On his homeward way, he arrived at length, 
on First Day, within a few miles of Quaker 
Hill. *'The road winds upward all the 
way," from the Connecticut valley, shut in 
by leafy fragrant woods, until the top of 
the hill is reached, when there suddenly 
bursts upon the view a vision to quicken 
the heart — the everlasting hills, stretching 
for miles along the horizon. As Paul Os- 



15 



born, reaching the crest of the hill, beheld 
this harbinger of home, he was met by a 
minister of another denomination, who, 
reining in his horse, called Paul to account 
for infringing the sacredness of the Con- 
necticut Sabbath, by traveling on that day. 
It would have been quite within reason for 
Paul to urge the fact of his wife's affliction 
— her blindness — in extenuation of his 
haste — but humor is a prerogative of every 
Osborn, so he gravely replied, without en- 
tering into particulars, that he was but 
hastening home to his wife, who had not 
seen him for forty years; whereupon he 
was allowed to go on his way rejoicing by 
the solemn busybody in other men's matters. 
In 1776 the war cloud that had muttered 
and lowered over the Colonies broke; and 
the next year the tide of war surged up 
and down the Harlem valley. One First 
Day morning, in the mellow October days 
of that year, the worshipping stillness of 
the Friends' Meeting was broken by the 
tramp of horses, and the jangling of spurs, 
as a band of soldiers rode up, dismounted 
and entered the building. They remained 
quiet and reverent, till the handshaking of 
the elders closed the meeting; then the 

16 



commanding officer rose, and in the name of 
the Continental Congress took possession of 
the building for a hospital for the troops, 
and as such it was used all that winter. 
After this, meetings were held in the ''great 
room" in the house of Paul Osborn, and 
were often frequented by soldiers stationed 
in the place, who listened attentively to the 
speaking, and left quietly at the close of 
meeting. 

In 1780, four years after the beginning 
of the Revolutionary war, Paul Osborn 
died, and was buried on his own land, and 
no man knoweth of his sepulchre at this 
day, and no stone marks the spot. But 
"e'en in his ashes live his wonted fires," 
and he being dead yet speaketh. 

His nephew Isaac, next in descent, was 
born in 1743, in Salem, Massachusetts, 
where he remained till he followed Paul 
Osborn to Quaker Hill. As a youth he 
lived through that most curious and dread- 
ful manifestation of superstitution and 
cruelty, the Salem Witchcraft. It natur- 
ally made a deep impression on his mind, 
susceptible as it must have been at that 
period. Doubtless he had many a gruesome 
tale to tell, on winter nights, when the stars 



17 



sparkled brighter and brighter as the bitter 
cold silently strengthened, or when snow 
flew, and the wind howled round the house, 
and up and down the great chimney throat, 
while the fire in the "great room" snapped 
defiance to the cold. Of these stories un- 
fortunately, only one, and that slight and 
vague, has been preserved ; namely, that ot 
a young girl's being seen to hold a rifle, 
straight and steady poised upon the tip of 
her extended forefinger. 

His wife Mary Irish died, leaving him 
two children, Paul and Phoebe; and he 
never married again, though often advised 
to do so, giving as a reason that "he thought 
too much of his children." He was a sturdy, 
robust man, of fine physique; his hair was 
snow white from his youth, and he was a 
stranger to all efl'eminacy. After the death 
of his wife, he took up his abode in the east 
end of the old house, and slept in the bed- 
room attached to the great room. With the 
mercury ranging several degrees below zero 
for days at a time, and no fire in the room, 
it would seem to the present generation a 
veritable "chamber of horrors." The only 
mitigation of the cold of the room came 
by means of the warming pan, a brass re- 

i8 



ceptacle for hot coals, set on a long handle, 
filled from the live embers of the hearth, 
and thrust, all glowing with grateful heat, 
between the "homespun" flannel sheets. 
But even this luxury was eschewed by the 
rugged old man, who, until near the close 
of his life, did not allow the warming pan 
to be brought him, saying **he could not 
sleep so warm." 

Isaac Osborn was a silent but striking 
figure in the Friends' Meetings held in the 
"great room." He never spoke in meeting ; 
but the man himself attracted more atten- 
tion from the Continental soldiers present 
at the meetings, than the speech of some 
more loquacious friends. At the least ap- 
proach of restlessness on the part of any 
one of the soldiers, the others would whis- 
per, ''Keep still, keep still, — maybe he will 
preach by and by." 

There was at that time a hat factory situ- 
ated at the foot of the long hill to the north 
of the Osborn place, and owned by one 
Joseph Seelye. When Isaac Osborn was 
eighty years old he instructed Joseph to 
make for him a hat, of the approved fuzzy 
beaver type. This was duly accomplished, 
to the entire satisfaction of Joseph Seelye, 



19 



who said with pardonable pride, when de- 
livering it to its owner: 

"There Isaac, that is a good hat; it will 
last thee all the rest of thy life, if thee dies 
in any sort of season!'' 

One is rejoiced to know that it did not 
outlast Isaac, but that he lived to order and 
to wear other hats. He died at the age of 
ninety-six years and six months, from a 
fractured skull, the consequence of a fall. 

Of his two children, Paul the elder was 
the father of Richard Osborn. !No facts 
about him seem ta be obtainable, except the 
dates of his birth, in 1782, his marriage to 
Jemima Titus, in 1806, and finally his 
death, in 1867. Of traditions, this one sur- 
vives, a tribute to his mercifulness to the 
brute creation. A neighbor once remarked 
that if he had to be a horse, he would like 
to be Paul Osborn's horse. He had three 
children, Isaac, William and Richard, all 
born on the old place. 

Richard Osborn, the present head of the 
family, was born in 1816. His earliest 
recollections hover round the room back of 
the "great room," in which stood an old- 
time high bedstead of the catafalque order, 
and of such altitude as to require steps for 



20 



its attainment. Under this structure in the 
daytime was rolled a trundle bed, to be 
rolled out each night for the accommoda- 
tion of Richard and his brother William. 
Opposite to the Meeting House, among the 
picturesque old willows, stood a little school- 
house in which was held a Friends' school, 
and here his school days were passed. 

He was a farmer's son, and as he grew 
to manhood business and inclination fre- 
quently carried him northward down the 
mile-long hill to Dover. At the foot of the 
hill lived Ira Hoag, who had several 
daughters, of whom one, Roby, attracted 
the attention and awakened the interest of 
Richard Osborn, and presently they were 
engaged to be married. The wedding took 
place Nov. 23d, 1842, in the New Meeting 
House. In the old building, in 1770, their 
grandparents had been married. 

The day was bright and warm, with the 
keen tingle of Autumn beneath its softness, 
and the sparkle of a light snow flurry at 
nightfall. Richard Osborn and his friend, 
Daniel Congdon, rising betimes, harnessed 
the horses, put them to the best carriage, 
and drove to Dover where the bride and 
her sister Mary awaited them. Her wed- 



21 



ding gown was thick, lustreless silk, of a 
delightful yellowish olive, her bonnet white. 
Beneath it her dark hair was smoothly 
banded, and from its demure shelter her 
eyes looked gravely out. His vest was a 
fine tawny brown, of a sprigged pattern, 
both gown and vest as artistically harmoni- 
ous as the product of an Eastern loom. 
Pieces of both are sewn into a patchwork 
quilt, now a family heirloom. 

Up the long hill to the Meeting House 
they drove, through the still dreaminess o£ 
the Indian Summer day, the glory of the 
hazy, purple hills before them, around them 
a symphony in sunlit greys and browns, and 
above, the measureless blue depths of the 
sky. It was Wednesday, the day of the 
regular midweek meeting, and the house 
was crowded. The young couple took their 
places upon the facing seats, and the meet- 
ing began. Daniel Haviland was minister 
and he spoke at length. Then, after a short 
pause, Richard Osborn and Roby Hoag 
arose, and, clasping hands, spoke alter- 
nately the few solemn sentences of the 
Friends' marriage ceremony, which have 
united them for sixty years in a union so 
excellent, so perfect in all respects, that even 



the casual observer feels it is not for time 
only, but for eternity. Then was brought 
forth the marriage certificate, fairly en- 
grossed in the bridegroom's own hand, and 
many names of those present were affixed, 
after which it was read aloud. This being 
done, and kindly greetings offered, Richard 
and Roby Osborn drove back to her home. 
The wedding was well furnished with 
guests, and four fat turkeys graced the 
board that day. Ten years ago, in the 
beautiful Indian Summer of 1892, and the 
still more beautiful Indian Summer of two 
well spent lives, the golden wedding was 
celebrated, and three of the guests who had 
been signers of the original certificate, af- 
fixed their names to the second one, being 
followed by two sons, a daughter, and five 
grandchildren. 

Mr, and Mrs. Osborn lived for awhile 
near what is now called Cass's Corners, 
and then moved to the site of the present 
postoffice. Here stood a brick house in 
which Lafayette had stayed during the me- 
morable year of 1778; this house they oc- 
cupied for some years. It was then taken 
down, and, the bricks being good, they were 
built into the house Mr. Osborn now occu- 



aj 



pies, this latter house being moved down 
from Seelye Hill. The lumber of which it 
is built was drawn in the rough from 
Poughkeepsie, by Joseph Seelye, in 1834. 
To drive to Poughkeepsie and back in a day 
was then no uncommon feat, and was once 
accomplished by Mr. and Mrs. Osborn for 
the purpose of exchanging a stove, whose 
draught was imperfect. In 1850 the first 
whistle of the railroad running through the 
Harlem Valley was heard, and to the listen- 
ing ears on Quaker Hill, Mr. Osborn 
quotes one of his neighbors as saying that 
''it had a very pleasant sound." In 1870 
the Pawling Savings Bank was incorpor- 
ated, and Mr. Osborn was elected a director, 
an office he still holds. He was for twenty- 
one consecutive years clerk of the Nine 
Partners' Meeting, located at what is now 
called the village of Millbrook; and he has 
served as clerk of some Meeting, for, in all, 
fifty seven years. He has always been, and 
is to-day, a clearly defined exponent of the 
faith of his ancestors. Like a silhouette of 
the olden time, clean cut, distinct, shadow- 
less, he stands against a chaotic background 
of modern thought ; decided, uncompromis- 
ing in his views; but so just, so kind, so 



24 



upright, so full of goodness, in short so 
lovable, if one may be permitted the word, 
that those who know him are well-nigh won 
to his opinions, through the strength of his 
personality. The facts of his life presented 
to-day, are few, simple, and insufficient to 
account for the undeniable influence he has 
wielded in the community. In migratory 
America, the fact that he is living to-day, 
with the sixth generation of his name, in 
the very spot his ancestors took possession 
of, one hundred and forty- two years ago, 
gives dignity to his surroundings ; but to 
himself alone are due the respect, consid- 
eration and affection which are accorded 
him by his friends and neighbors. His Hfe 
is the mellowed fruit of a strenuous ances- 
tral training ; and he keeps the simplicity of 
his forefathers without disdaining the 
larger opportunity of his own day. 

Gone are the days of great fireplaces, and 
their wood fires ; of hook and crane, of home 
spinning and weaving, of pillions and saddle 
bags : we look back at them with a kind of 
wistful regret for their lost picturesqueness, 
but with no longing to return to them and 
their paucity of resource. To-day, the 
sharp, insistent rasp of the telephone bell 



25 



makes incessant, mandatory calls upon the 
Osborn family, and they may order their 
stoves, (or their hot water heating plants,) 
from Poughkeepsie, New York or Chicago, 
in five minutes. 

Well did the men and women of those 
past days fulfill their devoir, living up to the 
light of their times; well shall it be for us 
of the present dowered age, if we be found, 
not degenerates, but worthy heritors of a 
worthy past. 

"Life greatens in these later years; 
The century's aloe flowers to-oay." 



26 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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